English The figure/ground relationship and identity in transformational, connectionist, and generative contemporaneity: an inclusive pedagogical perspective

Abstract

The present contribution is conceived as a theoretical – interpretative model that foregrounds the figure/ground relationship, anchored in the Flipped Inclusion framework, as a central interpretative key for understanding inclusive processes within today’s digital and relational ecologies (Turkle, 2011). Drawing on phenomenological, dialogical, and ecological perspectives (MerleauPonty, 2001; Buber, 1958; Bronfenbrenner, 1979), the article examines how the dynamic configuration of what emerges as figure and the conditions that constitute the ground shape participation, attention, and meaningmaking in students. Complexity (Morin, 1999) and transformative processes (Mezirow, 2018) are integrated with the pedagogical paradigm of semplessity (Sibilio, 2014) operationalized through the Flipped Inclusion model (Corona & De Giuseppe, 2017), employed as a generative logic to enhance the emergence of meaningful educational figures (Corona & De Giuseppe, 2015). A “figure/ground model of orientative pedagogy” is proposed, in which: the figure/ground dynamic is embedded within the EIPS phases of Flipped Inclusion; semplessity organizes complexity (Berthoz, 2011); students’ agency (Aiello, 2022) is the expected outcome; and transformational leadership (Burns, 1978) provides the framework through which teachers and educational contexts can promote flexible, participatory, and complexitysensitive — thus inclusive — learning environments (Sibilio, 2023).